1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic device, connected to another electric device, for managing a removable storage medium, and a method and a storage medium therefor.
2. Related Background Art
The networking of imaging devices such as a digital camera or digital camcorder has recently progressed and there is being developed an environment capable of connecting such devices with a personal computer or peripheral devices thereof at home.
Many such imaging devices are provided with a removable storage medium (also called simply a “removable medium”), and store various digital information (still image data, moving image data, audio data, text data, etc.) in such removable medium by converting such information into a file of predetermined format.
For making access from an imaging device (first imaging device) connected to a network to a removable storage medium connected to another imaging device (second imaging device), there can be conceived the following two methods. The first method consists of the user manually moving the desired storage medium from the second imaging device to the first imaging device and making direct access by the first imaging device to the storage medium. The second method consists of making access by the first imaging device to the desired storage medium without moving the removable storage medium from the second imaging device to the first imaging device (namely while the storage medium is connected to the second imaging device).
In order to exploit the first method, however, each imaging device has to be provided with a structure capable of directly connecting with the storage medium desired by the user. Particularly in a case where storage media of plural kinds are desired by the user, each imaging device has to be capable of accommodating all such storage media. Such requirement, however, results in the drawback of hindering the compactization, simplification and cost reduction of the imaging device. There is also encountered the drawback that a new kind of storage medium cannot be accommodated.
On the other hand, in order to exploit the second method, the first imaging device has to be provided with a procedure for judging or recognizing a replacement of the storage medium connected to the second imaging device or a change in the content of such storage medium. Without such procedure, there cannot be avoided erroneous operations such as deletion of a file not intended by the user, addition of a file to a storage medium not intended by the user, or deletion of a file from a storage medium not intended by the user.